osprey_archer | Fic: Loyalty for Felicity, chapter 6

Aaaaaand done!

Fic: Loyalty for Felicity
Fandom: American Girl - Felicity
Rating: G

Felicity burst in on her mother in the breakfast room. “Mother, you have to fire the overseer,” she cried. “He threatened Dido – with a knife! – he said Marcus ran away, because I sent Marcus to Williamsburg on Bucephalus, and – and – ” Felicity stuttered to a halt, trapped between lying to her mother and tattling on Dido.

But Mrs. Merriman wasn’t thinking about that. “Felicity!” she chided. “Is this the way to greet a guest?”

Her admonishing tone brought Felicity up short. She suddenly realized that one stocking had fallen down around her ankle, her cheeks were flushed from the kitchen heat, and she hadn’t even greeted Mrs. Cole, who sat across from her mother at the table.

Felicity bobbed a curtsey, mortified. “Mrs. Cole,” she said. “Mother, Good morning.” What if her lack of manners made Mrs. Cole decide not to let her see Elizabeth after all? “I…I hope Elizabeth is well.”

Mrs. Cole nodded stiffly. She didn’t quite look at Felicity, but she said, “Our Bitsy’s awake. You can – ” Mrs. Cole paused, gathering herself to finish the sentence. Felicity held her breath. “You can see her now.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Cole,” Felicity said. “Oh, thank you, you are so kind. You know I would never knowingly do anything to hurt your daughter. I – ”

Mrs. Merriman stood and gently steered Felicity out of the room. “Don’t give Mrs. Cole time to reconsider,” she murmured as they walked up the stairs.

Mrs Merriman was often very wise.

“Mother,” Felicity said. “Mr. Jameson – ”

“When your father is home next I’ll talk to him about firing Mr. Jameson. Threatening our servants with a knife…” Mrs. Merriman shook her head. “Your grandfather never would have stood for that; Dido and Marcus are practically part of the family, they would never run away. I’ll go see Dido and apologize for Mr. Jameson’s behavior. Oh, what a horrible man: shouting at poor Dido when she’s suffered such a loss.”

***

Elizabeth’s room was dark, the drapes drawn shut, because too much light was not good for the eyes of scarlet fever victims. Elizabeth lay still, her face very pale and white in the dark room.

She looked so like an angel that Felicity found she couldn’t breath. What if Elizabeth had died, after all?

But then Elizabeth opened her eyes and blinked at her hazily. “Lissie,” she said. She made a little movement as if to sit up, then fell back against the pillows. Felicity gave a little cry and rushed over to her, sitting on the edge of the bed and clasping Elizabeth’s limp hand in hers. “Oh, Lissie, don’t cry,” Elizabeth murmured.

“I’m not crying,” Felicity replied, smiling through her tears. She buried her face in Elizabeth’s shoulder. “Oh, Elizabeth – ”

“Don’t tire her out,” Mrs. Merriman said. “Felicity, we should go.”

But Elizabeth stirred. “No, Mrs. Merriman, please let her stay. She won’t tire me – will you, Felicity?” Felicity sat up, back very straight, and shook her head. “And I’ll just fret terribly if we can’t talk,” Elizabeth added earnestly.

Mrs. Merriman looked between the two, and smiled. “All right,” she said, and gave Felicity a mock stern look. “But mind you keep the talk to light topics, Felicity.”

“Of course!” Felicity said. Her mother smiled again, and shut the door behind her as she left.

Felicity nestled in next to Elizabeth on the bed, finger-combing the tangles out of her friend’s hair. “I’m so glad you’re well,” she said. Her eyes smarted again, and she kissed Elizabeth’s hair to hide her tears.

“I must have been terribly ill,” Elizabeth said. “Even Annabelle cried. Mother says we won’t be able to sail to England till the spring, at least, so I’ll have time to recover. And she said they never meant to marry me to my horrid cousin at all! I feel like such a goose, Felicity. Did I say anything terribly stupid while we were running away?”

“Aside from suggesting we run away?” Felicity asked, and Elizabeth laughed softly. It faded into a cough. “No. Don’t you remember?”

“Just bits and bobs. I remember running to your house, and riding through the woods – I was so cold – and oh, we met an awful man; he was so rude to you. Did that really happen?”

“Yes! He’s the overseer. Oh, Elizabeth, you don’t know the half of how awful he is,” Felicity said indignantly, forgetting entirely that she wasn’t supposed to excite Elizabeth, and sitting up to face her. “He threatened Dido with a knife today,” she began, and ran through the whole story, her face growing pink with indignation. “And what do you think!” she ended, dropping her voice to a furious whisper. “He – promise you won’t tell?”

“Of course,” Elizabeth said, round-eyed.

“He was right, Dido did help Marcus run away! He didn’t go to get help for you at all. I feel such a fool: I always thought she liked me, Elizabeth.”

“I’m sure she likes you,” Elizabeth said. “Everyone likes you. But you can’t expect her to like you more than her own family, can you?”

Felicity sighed. “No,” she said. “You can’t expect that of anyone, no matter how much they may like you.”

The sudden silence was prickly. “Oh, I’m sorry – ” Felicity began.

“I’m never meant – ” Elizabeth started, and they both stopped; and Elizabeth said, “You go first – ” Just as Felicity said, “You go ahead.”

They looked at each other, and laughed. “I will go first,” said Felicity. “As it was all my fault. If I hadn’t said those thoughtless things about Loyalists to you, we never would have argued, and we could have spent the whole summer together.”

“Oh, but it’s not your fault, Lissie,” said Elizabeth. “It takes two to make a quarrel. I should have just ignored it.”

“Yes, but – no, but I shouldn’t have said it – you never said anything so careless about Patriots – oh how silly it is, arguing about whose fault our argument is!” Felicity said, laughing at herself. “Let’s never argue again, Elizabeth. Let’s swear not to.”

“I don’t think that’s possible,” Elizabeth objected. “You know I adore you, Felicity, but I shall never agree with your poor opinion of Pamela.”

“I still think it would have been a far better book if she dressed as a boy and escaped Mr. B!” Felicity protested. “How can you be glad they wed, he’s a horror!”

“There, you see! An argument. And we always disagree about Shakespeare, too: I can’t see how you admire Brutus so, when he betrayed…” Elizabeth started coughing. Felicity grasped Elizabeth’s hand. Elizabeth squeezed back, her grip weak from days of fever, but warm. “I don’t mind if we argue. But please, promise you’ll always be my friend, Lissie.”

Felicity kissed Elizabeth’s hand. “I swear to you, Elizabeth, however long this war lasts, and whoever wins it, and even if you go back to England and I never see you again until Judgment Day, I swear to you, I will remain your loyal friend.” Elizabeth smiled up at her, a delicate flush in her wan cheeks. “I’ll swear it on anything,” Felicity said. “Even the king, if you want.”

“No,” said Elizabeth. “Swear it by something that means something to you – swear by the Continental Congress.”

“I swear it by…by General Washington,” said Felicity, and kissed Elizabeth’s hand again. “I swear it on the Bible, and I swear it…I swear it on our friendship.”

“And I swear it on His Majesty King George III,” Elizabeth said, and laughed softly, almost coughing. “Can you swear friendship on the friendship itself?”

“Yes,” said Felicity. “Because politics are always changing, but our friendship won’t. Faithful friends forever be – remember?”

“Always,” Elizabeth said.